LOYAL workers who have stayed on at Longbridge to complete the last cars have been snubbed over pay bonuses while over 100 Powertrain staff get three weeks' extra wages.

LOYAL workers who have stayed on at Longbridge to complete the last cars have been snubbed over pay bonuses while over 100 Powertrain staff get three weeks' extra wages.

A bitter pay row has erupted in the death throes of the MG Rover administration over loyalty bonuses awarded to all Powertrain employees.

Shopfloor workers at MG Rover making the last cars before the Nanjing takeover have been denied bonuses averaging #900 awarded to Powertrain shopfloor workers, it emerged today.

And some white-collar Powertrain managers are said to have been given bonuses of up to #1,800.

An MG Rover worker, who refused to be identified, said: "If your face fits, then you get loyalty bonuses. Everybody at Powertrain has been given three weeks' bonuses - they have been kept on to do engine production for Ford for the Land Rover Discovery.

"I also know of managers who have been given #1,800 as loyalty bonuses to keep them here. But the shopfloor workers at MG Rover haven't had a penny. There are people here who are very disappointed. Nobody in the paint-shop and body in white has had a penny.

"We are the ones who are doing the work finishing off the cars and we're being ignored."

Administrators from PricewaterhouseCoopers are still forking out thousands of pounds a week in wages to keep up to 300 people on the Longbridge payroll as the six-month "lift and shift" operation gets underway. PWC are keeping a skeleton staff on at the plant, including 200 at MG Rover and 100 at Powertrain, while they seek to realise the remaining assets, including 2,000 cars.

Rob Hunt, senior administrator at PWC, said last week that 75 people were working on the shopfloor at Powertrain with a further 25 support staff.

Meanwhile, MG Rover is retaining a 200-strong workforce, including 45 in Human Resources, 25 security staff and a finance team as well as production workers.

A union source said: "Powertrain workers have been given an extra three weeks' money. They have not been made redundant because they were kept on to complete the engines for Ford."

Andrew Dodgson, spokesman for the TGWU, said the union was investigating the loyalty bonus claims.